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The owners of Chernobyl (the government) didn't declare bankruptcy and piss off, they spent massive moneys containing the problem. So, socialize profits, socia
by cortic 6y ago
The owners of Chernobyl (the government) didn't declare bankruptcy and piss off, they spent massive moneys containing the problem. So, socialize profits, socialize losses.
Trying to stop catastrophes from happening needs regulation and incentives, both of these things are broken in capitalism by its nature. But its not impossible to have regulation and incentives in either capitalist or socialist projects.
- indymike 6y agoCounting on government to hold itself liable for environmental damage is a proven bad default.
- natmaka 6y agoThe USSR government collapsed a few years after the Chernobyl disaster and didn't foot the bill of most of its costs. It now costs huge amounts of money to Belarus, which gov has nothing to do with USSR nuclear projects. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53727243 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53727243 The European Union gave (and, until now, gives) huge amounts of money in order to contain the problem, for example the sarcophagus. https://time.com/5255663/chernobyl-disaster-book-anniversary/ https://time.com/5255663/chernobyl-disaster-book-anniversary...
- ohyeshedid 6y agoBoth examples of socialized losses.
- natmaka 6y ago"Someone pays for losses" is always true. "Socialized losses", as far as I understand it, means that the group paying for the losses is the same one as the one which is/was the beneficiary. Does someone think that EU citizens were set to benefit from the Chernobyl plant?
- Can_Not 6y agoThe saying is usually more like "privatize the profits, socialize the loses", which is derived from "socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor". The point of the phrase is that the people who are paying for the costs (tax payers) are not the ones who received any benefit or were going to benefit (profits, shareholders, CEOs, etc.). https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemon_socialism https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemon_socialism
- natmaka 6y agoIndeed, however the case in point is the Chernobyl disaster, and in the USSR there AFAIK were no profits/shareholders/CEOs... My point is that such scam isn't specific to the degraded version of capitalism so common in our nations, which is in fact "crony capitalism".
- Can_Not 6y agoI always found the tribalistic "crony capitalism" vs "crony socialism" debate to be a convenient escape from actually discussing the removal of cronyism.
- natmaka 6y agoSo often true! We patently cannot tackle cronyism thanks to any powerful institution. In fact anything powerful nurtures it.